Attendees at the Opening Plenary Session were greeted with a special recorded video message from Chairman of Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System Ben Bernanke.

In addressing the K-12 teachers, industry thought-leaders and Federal Reserve partners, Chairman Bernanke praised the work of teachers in preparing students to make financial decisions for their own personal success, and in teaching the next generation to become informed citizens on which the country depends.

At the conference, CEE introduced the Voluntary National Content Standards in K-12 Personal Finance, providing a framework for teaching personal finance in kindergarten through 12th grade. Chairman Bernanke highlighted the importance of the collaboration between CEE and the Federal Reserve System on these standards.

In his summary to our attendees, Chairman Bernanke asked the educators to remember that the Federal Reserve System is a partner and a resource, and he thanked teachers for their dedication to our young people and their families.

The 51st Annual Conference received excellent coverage from across the country, including:

This week CEE hosts the 51st Annual National Financial Literacy and Economic Education Conference. Held in Kansas City, MO October 4 – 6, with more than 500 educators, industry thought-leaders and Federal Reserve partners convening to address the most important issues and obstacles and honor excellence in financial and economic education. Among the highlights of this year’s conference are the introduction of a new Common Core alignment initiative and new Voluntary Personal Finance Standards, furthering the CEE’s mission of strengthening the economic and financial education of students from kindergarten through high school.

During the Opening Plenary Session Thursday October 4, with keynote speaker Troy Davig, Senior VP & Director of Research, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, CEE will introduce the Voluntary National Content Standards in K-12 Personal Finance, providing a framework for teaching personal finance in kindergarten through 12th grade. The standards contain the areas of knowledge and understanding that are fundamental to personal finance: Earning Income, Buying Goods and Services, Using Credit, Saving, Financial Investing, and Protecting and Insuring, each of which include benchmarks outlining what a student should be able to understand and examples at the 4th, 8th and 12th grade levels.

Friday, October 5, Doug Sovde, Director, PARCC Instructional Supports & Educator Engagement discusses Common Core: What It Means for Financial Literacy and Economics, announcing a new initiative to align resources in economics and personal finance to the Common Core State Standards in mathematics and English Language Arts. The CCSS were established to bring some uniformity to the varied state curricula, and is one of the most significant forces driving K-12 education today. But while adoption has been widespread, teachers are struggling with implementation. As a solution, CEE has proposed developing an easy-to-use tool that easily connects teachers to high-quality lessons in economics and personal finance that will help them to meet the standards laid out in the CCSS.

CEE will also recognize the winners of the 2012 John Morton Excellence in the Teaching of Economics Awards:Elementary
Kathy Heyse
Sun Valley Elementary School
Monroe, NC

The Federal Reserve System is preparing an inventory of historical materials to enhance transparency through improved web access to records of the Federal Reserve’s past. The initiative is motivated by the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Federal Reserve Act in December 2013 and the 100th anniversary of the opening of the Federal Reserve Banks in November 2014. The inventory will serve as a resource for teachers, researchers, academics, and others interested in studying the history of the nation’s central bank.

As a potential user, we would value your feedback, via this survey, about resources you currently use and favor, as well as features that you might find useful in accessing historical materials. The survey will take approximately 10 minutes to complete.

Your participation is confidential and anonymous. Outside of broad classification information, no specific personal information is requested or collected.

Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke addressed the nation this week through his “Conversation with the Chairman: A Teacher Town Hall Meeting” live video conference.

The subject? Financial literacy.

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, the growing concern continues to be how we as a nation will teach our children the importance of financial literacy so they do not make the same mistakes. Chairman Bernanke opened the town hall with a brief speech where he gave credit to the Council for Economic Education’s National Standards for Personal Finance (to be released later this year) by saying “To provide the most effective education, curriculums should also have clear standards and goals…The five core competencies are reflected in the National Standards for Personal Finance being developed by the Council for Economic Education; several of our Federal Reserve System colleagues are working with the Council on this project.”

Chairman Bernanke graciously took questions from economics and personal finance educators who gathered at each of the Federal Reserve banks across the country. Educators asked questions covering the gamut of topics, from which current events should be taught in the classroom to how to prevent the next financial crisis.

The Chairman’s responses were coincidentally much aligned to the work we do at CEE. He recommended games and simulations as one of the best ways to teach young students about personal finance. CEE’s own Gen i Revolution is a free, online personal finance game that teaches high school students the basics of personal finance, including creating budgets, basic investing and how to use credit wisely.

Teachers understand the importance of drawing on real-world scenarios to teach their students in the classroom. Chairman Bernanke addressed the question from a teacher of which current events should be taught in the classroom. There is no definite answer to which specific events, but any current news items make for good classroom fodder. EconEdLink, CEE’s free classroom resources for K-12 teachers of economics and personal finance, provides access to the latest economic news and information and related lesson plans in Teaching the News.

CEE convened our own panel of educators to watch the Chairman’s address, and we continued the conversation after the town hall ended.

Dawn Shum, an elementary teacher in New York, reiterated the importance of personal finance in the classroom and at home by saying, “We need to educate elementary students beyond identifying quarters and dimes.”

We couldn’t agree more.

CEE thanks the Chairman and the Federal Reserve for bringing attention to the importance of financial literacy, and for taking questions from our nation’s educators who work tirelessly to teach these life skills to future generations.

Thank you for spending time today with our country’s greatest asset – educators – who ensure the next generation of our children are prepared for the future.

Today’s ‘Conversation with the Chairman: A Teacher Town Hall Meeting’ was an important point of outreach to K-12 educators and organizations who are working each day to improve economics and financial literacy across the country. The Council for Economic Education is especially pleased to know that you believe in supporting educators who teach these life skills to our students, and that you recognize our dedication to instilling in young people the fourth “R”—a real-world understanding of economics and personal finance.

Thank you for bringing attention to the CEE’s work on the National Standards for Personal Finance, which will be released later this year. We are proud to work closely with experts from the Federal Reserve system on the development of these standards. It is an important project that will assist teachers in providing effective education to their students, and help school districts to implement a solid curriculum plan around personal finance.

We look forward to your continued support of financial literacy and economic education as we advance our delivery of educator resources, professional development and programs for K-12 educators.

The Federal Reserve System has just announced plans to offer comprehensive, single-point access to its inventory of historical materials, a valuable resource for researchers, academics, and anyone interested in the chronicle of the nation’s central bank. The inventory will be the first of several initiatives surrounding the Federal Reserve’s double-centennial, with hundred-year anniversaries of the signing of the Federal Reserve Act and the opening of the Federal Reserve Banks in December 2013 and November 2014.

Overseeing the Federal Reserve’s centennial initiatives is the Centennial Advisory Council, comprised of 24 members from the public and private sectors. Working in conjunction with a planning committee chaired by Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Federal Reserve Bank in Richmond, the Centennial Advisory Council will keep the budget for celebration and substantive work on-balance and conduct further educational outreach. Council for Economic Education’s CEO and President Nan J. Morrison has been appointed as a member alongside honorary co-chairs Paul A. Volcker and Alan Greenspan.

The Federal Reserve inventory will identify materials that are currently available from a variety of sources, including the websites of the Reserve Banks and the Board of Governors, the Federal Reserve Archival System for Economic Research, websites housed at universities, and private collections. It will also include information about material that is not yet available online but is currently being considered for digitization and posting. With improved web access to its texts, photographs, video and audio recordings, the Federal Reserve will enhance transparency, putting its archival records directly in the hands of the public.

As part of its efforts to expand the inventory, the Federal Reserve invites historians, scholars, and all interested members of the public to submit historical sources for inclusion that aren’t listed. The inventory and additional information about the Centennial are available at any of Federal Reserve Bank’s state websites and the official site of the Board of Governors.